


Did Standardash Falter?

by kmfillz



Category: Dwarf Fortress
Genre: Canon-Typical Death and Violence, Gen, ToT: Monster Mash, Trick or Treat: Trick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-31
Updated: 2017-10-31
Packaged: 2019-01-22 21:08:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12490872
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kmfillz/pseuds/kmfillz
Summary: We arrived at Standardash, in the Bog of Weeping, on the 19th of Limestone, 144.  We found four survivors.(An exchange gift written forTrick or Treat 2017.)





	Did Standardash Falter?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tuesday](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tuesday/gifts).



Our people have always made our homes in the Problematic Mountains. By pick and plow and forge we have shaped these forbidding stony crags into gleaming halls and cascades of fiery magma. These barren-seeming peaks form the heart of civilization itself, that Tool of Lucidity which separates the dwarf from the savage, thieving kobold. Without civilization, we too would live in filthy caves, hoarding stolen trinkets, nonsensically jabbering "Frelalarimbus! Cholopis! Beembus!"

_[Ed. -- The inclusion of the name of the kobold serial killer Beembus, better known as the Sable Death, was entirely accidental. We apologize to any readers who were offended, and extend our sympathies to the survivors of the Sable Death's rampages.]_

If you linger in taverns, late at night, after the last giddy round of the Wheel of Harmony has been danced and after the last amateurish composition in the form of the Glittering Caverns has been drunkenly recited, you may hear travelers tell wild tales of bands of dwarves delving the mountains of the scorching north, where warm tropical waters lap against the shores of Warm Dreamy Jungles.

Such rumors have always existed, but don't believe them. If, against all reason, such a Bold Guild does exist, to them I say, you are certainly Bold to stray so far, but are you Lucid? The Mountains, however Problematic their cliffs and gorges may be to traders, migrants, and adventurers, are the true home of dwarvenkind, and all dwarves who would venture beyond them are fools. Dead fools, most of them.

Before I go any further, I must stress that none of what I am about to recount was my fault. Yes, I was the expedition leader in the end, when the settlement crumbled and we loaded up our personal belongings and left. Contrary to popular misconception, expedition leader is a primarily ceremonial post. The only duty involved is to act as diplomat if needed (which it wasn't) until such time as a mayor can be elected (which was never). The position comes with neither perks nor privileges. Would a modest office really have been too much to ask? Apparently it would, because I received nothing but a dormitory bunk. That was an improvement over sleeping outside, certainly, but the noisy sleeping area left me unfocused during the days, when attention was needed just to survive.

I, Zutthan Rinsedshields, daughter of Zulban and Ïteb, departed for Standardash in the summer of 144, full of optimism and enthusiasm. Standardash had been settled only the year before, but already their efforts were legend in the Mountainhomes. Merchants who visited Standardash brought back offerings of totems and shining gems, and told of settlers living like kings. "Living like kings", they said, and I should have laughed and told them no dwarven monarch would willingly live in the wretched lowlands. But I was a young veteran, fresh from my service in the Ferocious Assault against the Revolting Hatred in the east, and all I heard in the merchants' tales was the call of opportunity.

With me came ten other immigrants. There were Bëmbul and Lolor, a young couple from the Relic of Communions; the Cloutedgem-Orbhoists with their two little boys; Led Hillcity, a fishery worker who had a cousin in Standardash; and Mafol Dunevessel, whose brother had departed for Standardash with his family some months before. The oldest members of our expedition were Rigòth Craftsouls and her husband Sodel, centenarians who were going to live with one of their eight grown offspring.

The expedition set out from Wallmanor, a town in the northern reaches of the Problematic Mountains, where the Spattered Hills slope gently down into the Mirthful Prairie that lies below. I found myself there after the war, for it is the perfect place to recuperate. Wallmanor is a beautiful spot, a short trip downriver from the gates of Nòmïteb. In the center of town is a natural spring from which flows a merry brook known as Brghtbl the Stunted Lances. (Yes, that is its name, or as best I can make out in the locals' mumbling northern accent.) The earth there is rich with metals and flux stone. The weather is temperate. The surrounding area is wooded but not elf-infested. If only I'd stayed there!

Instead, I and my fellow immigrants and our pack animals set off across the Mirthful Prairie, which I submit is misleadingly named. The Mirthful Prairie is nothing more than your average, everyday wilderness, boasting unmissable and unforgettable attractions such as... shrubs. And more shrubs. Bah! Anyone who wants _real_ mirth should try the rocky wastelands of the Laconic Dune. You'll find a barrel of laughs there, I promise. Truly, can there be anything more hilarious than spending day after day certain you'll be killed by herds of moss-covered zombie unicorns as you travel south and west and south and west until the Afflicted Rocks tower on the horizon, promising you entrance to the grand halls of Cuborkonos?

Alas, we turned our backs to Cuborkonos, and continued on south. If we had headed east at this point, we would have reached Echoring, our frontier against the goblin menace, where I had previously been stationed. Echoring sits alone on the edge of the Teeth of Quiescence. Are there any names in the world that aren't ironic? Geologists say that the war-torn Teeth of Quiescence ought properly to be considered an outcropping of the Problematic Mountains, but to the naked eye it is a peak that juts up out of the surrounding swampland without warning. It itself is the warning: _goblins, this is your last chance to retreat back into the dark pits from whence you crawled._ But south, where we were going, there was no warning, except the one we should have deduced from common sense: _dwarves belong in the mountains_.

And so we arrived at Standardash, in Prime Mire at the edge of the Bog of Weeping, on the 19th of Limestone, 144. It had been a long day's journey, and the clouds massing in the west worried me. Autumn comes early in the south, and already we had cold muck oozing into our low boots from places where, here and there, the road had sunk completley into the mire. Little Aban and Etur, sturdy travelers despite their tender age, had been complaining loudly all afternoon of mud matting in their long, braided beards. I was worried some of us might catch a chill if rain soaked through our coats and pig tail cloth caps. Looking back, I could almost laugh at how badly I underestimated the dangers weather in Standardash could bring. Nevertheless, at the time, water falling from the sky on a cold day seemed like a serious concern.

Thus it was a relief when the unpaved road we'd been following curved into the familiar gulch of a trade depot. We had reached the fortress; everything was going to be alright. At first sight, Standardash looked utterly unremarkable. The waning evening light illuminated a tidy vegetable garden and a small garbage heap, and beyond that, gates leading down into the fortress. Squelching step by squelching step, we approached. I thought ahead happily to taking off my boots, putting up my feet, and sleeping finally in a real bed.

We were nearly at the gates when Mafol stopped short. She grabbed my sleeve to stop me as well. "Over there, through the trees -- did you see that?"

I didn't, but a moment later, I heard the voices. It sounded like children laughing. The sound rustled through the underbrush, coming from the direction Mafol was pointing. Only then did I realize something was horribly wrong with the scene around us.

Standardash had been a settlement of forty-some dwarves, according to the latest figures available in the Mountainhomes. Merchants reported a thriving fortress. So where was everyone? Where were the livestock? Where were the noises of industry, the ringing of hammers and the hubbub of conversation? Only a child's giggle disturbed the stillness of the swamp.

"Stay here," I told the others. Unburdening myself of my pack, I crept as stealthily as I could through the vegetation toward the source of the sound. Glimpses were visible of something moving behind a screen of swaying willow branches. When I was very close, I drew my dagger, unsure of what I would face on the other side of that willow. Peeking around the trunk, I finally saw them: two children, no older than Aban and Etur, playing with a silver toy forge. I tucked the dagger back in its sheath and stood up, clearing my throat.

The children ignored me.

"Greetings from the Mountainhomes," I tried, formally.

The children ignored me.

"CHILDREN!" I belowed.

"Eat us or go away," sing-songed the smaller of the two. The older one laughed and batted at him with the toy hammer.

"They don't listen to you, dumbface," he told his brother. "And they'll do that anyway. You don't need to tell them."

I had been practicing on my patience with children for those past months on the road, but the Cloutedgem-Orbhoist children had never behaved in such a perplexing manner. "I'm not going to eat you," I said, with some aggravation, "and I'm not going to go away. I have arrived after a grueling journey, and I would like secure lodging before winter entombs us or the dingo men get hungry."

The older boy finally faced me, a serious expression on his young face. "Dingo men never come here. And it's not time for anyone to be eaten for weeks yet." He scratched his head. "You can go inside, I guess. Adil and Vabôk are there." He went back to his game.

With the muck in my boots and the ache in my limbs, there was no sense in standing around trying to get sense out of those children. I returned to the others at the gates, answering their questions with a roll of my eyes -- _children, pfah!_ \-- and we entered.

It was eerily quiet inside the fortress as well, but not completely silent. Descending past agricultural burrows dug out of sandy clay, we found ourselves in smooth-carved caverns. Off the shale walls echoed the muted sounds of a low conversation. We followed the echoes past empty and ruined workshops, and at last we found the only remnants of the government of Standardash.

Adil Gatebeaches and Vabôk Gravelice turned out to be an elderly pair of dwarves at least two hundred years old, born, I would say, in a time before time. Their clothes, though made of finest emerald-dyed wool, were tattered and patched, and looked out of place beneath the heavy jewelry both wore, golden earrings and gem-studded rings and bracelets of bone. Adil was cutting milk opals and Vabôk was setting the cut stones into the headboard of a well-made willow wood bed when we found them.

Introductions were made tersely, our weariness and perplexity at the condition of the fortress having left us in no mood for pleasantries. They were none too hospitable themselves. "Ach, you're not merchants," Vabôk exclaimed, eyeing our packs disapprovingly. "You can't stay here."

His announcement caused general outrage among my traveling companions. "What do you mean, we can't stay here?!" cried Rigòth Craftsouls. "We came all this way, and we're not going back!"

Adil waved a jeweled hand quellingly. "No, no, you're not going back. Any clothiers among you, perchance? No? Well, you can learn, you can learn."

"They can stay, but they won't _stay._ " Vabôk tugged at his beard in agitation. "Look at them! So skinny you could bite them in half."

In the case of the children or Sodel, this was true enough -- they could be terrorized by a fluffy wambler or knocked over by a stiff breeze -- but I was a fine figure of a dwarf, and a veteran besides. I told the elders sternly that I had fought hordes of armed goblins, and was not the sort to quail in the face of dingo men or cave trolls.

"Dingo men don't come here," said Adil.

"Unicorns, then?" I confess, I felt somewhat daunted by the prospect.

"Unicorns don't come here," said Vabôk, with a look that said he thought I was an idiot.

"Whatever it is, I can take it." I squared my shoulders and clasped my hands behind my back. They let children play alone in the swamp, and they were worried about _me_?

"Ha!" said Vabôk. "You think this is the first time I've heard that? Every last one of them told me they could handle it, and look how that turned out."

"Where _are_ the others?" asked Rigòth.

An awkward pause followed. Adil and Vabôk seemed suddenly fascinated by the (admittedly masterful) floor carvings.

"My son, Èrith," Rigòth insisted. "Where is he?"

Sodel took his wife's hand, seeking comfort as much as providing it.

"Èrith's wife, Deduk. Where is she? Where are their children, my grandchildren?"

"Where do you think they are?" Vabôk asked sharply. "Same as the rest; what did you expect?"

"I expect answers!" Rigòth roared. Vabôk cringed. Adil stood and made a pacifying gesture.

The shouting continued for quite some time, but the elders would say nothing other than the other settlers were gone. Gone where? They shook their heads and repeated, "Gone."

It was no use trying to get any explanation from them, and eventually all gave up. We unpacked our belongings in the dormitory, a little cramped, but otherwise just as ornate as we had been promised, and settled in. At this point, it did not occur to us that we could -- much less, should -- turn around and return north to the slopes of true civilization. We had come here to make our fortune, and clearly there was fortune here to be made.

In the days and weeks that followed, there was much to do, and for most of us, little time to dwell. I admit that I was annoyed to be sleeping without a proper room, but weeding the vegetable garden and replanting the fallow farm plots in the agricultural burrows kept me satisfied at work, and as much as I was bothered by the lack of privacy, the many fine beds of the dormitory were a pleasure to behold. The Cloutedgem-Orbhoist boys became fast friends with the children we had met outside that first evening. Young Thob and Såkzul's father, it came out, had been a performer in the Helpful Tour for two years of his life, prior to coming to Standardash and his subsequent (back then, still unexplained) disappearance, and Thob could often be found leading the children in a meager rendition of the Veneration of Pantomimes outside, under the canopies of the willows. This was perfectly safe, for there were indeed no dingo men to be seen, and the weather was mild and clear those first few weeks. We weren't exactly euphoric, but we were unfettered here, and keeping busy.

Rigòth was the only one unhappy. It troubled her to be away from family for so long. She grew increasingly bitter after getting into argument after argument with Adil and Vabôk, and halfway through our second week in Standardash, after a particularly bad day in which she was accosted by mussels on her daily walk along the river, she had a tantrum where she smashed up some chairs in the dining hall with her pick. They were flimsy wooden things, no real harm done. Sodel got to work replacing them with more impressive rock thrones, and for the meantime we made do with the ornate but uncomfortable stone benches that circled the entire hall.

The fortress, for the most part, flourished. By the time traders arrived from the north, we had Bëmbul's sun berry and muck root biscuits, Vabôk and Adil's gems and baubles, and an excess of wine and beer of all types to trade. I am not a skilled appraiser, but in the absence of anyone more experienced, I stepped up to act as broker for the outpost. I bought us a breeding pair of llamas for milk and wool, a gaggle of guineahens for eggs (thinking fondly of the egg roasts I had enjoyed back in Wallmanor), and even a pet hamster for little Aban, who had taken a liking to its puffy cheeks the moment the merchants unloaded it from their wagon into the trade depot. Aban named his new pet Sakubbabin, and promptly carried it off to terrorize his little brother with. Poor Etur detested hamsters; to this day I remember that clearly, while so many other details have been drowned out by the horrors that were soon to follow.

On the 11th of Sandstone, 144, while most inhabitants of Standardash were bustling about carrying goods to and from the trade depot, Adil Gatebeaches and Vabôk Gravelice transformed into giant multi-limbed jaguar creatures and duelled each other to the death. I did not witness this event personally, but the evidence afterward was clear enough. When its fellow lay dead, the surviving monster proceeded turned on us. Our brave militia-commander, Mafol Dunevessel, leapt to our defense, but was swiftly struck down, bitten in half by a single chop of those slavering jaws.

The creature that had been Adil, identifiable only by the shredded garments that hung off that massive, twisted form, assaulted the merchants, and even their trained guards were helpless against her. I had been a soldier once, but what could I do that the guards and Mafol had not done? We were massacred. Some of us hid, some fled, some tried to defend themselves. Finally, after two days of terror, having slaughtered brave Mafol, pick-wielding Rigòth, frail Sodel, Cerol Orbhoist, Lolor Mirrortraded, Led Hillcity, all of the merchants, and many pets and farm animals, leaving only myself, Urvad Cloutedgem, Bëmbul Relicblowing, and the children alive, Adil again became a dwarf and returned to the jeweller's workshop. When one of us, Bëmbul, was brave enough to venture in, she found Adil there, stark naked, humming to herself as she polished a batch of clear tourmalines.

We went on as best we could, though we were all in shock. There was blood everywhere, body parts strewn this way and that throughout the fortress, workshops in ruins. The state of the place when we had arrived was now beginning to make sense. Cleaning it up was a nightmare in itself: scrubbing the floors of gore, scrubbing the vomit left by the dwarf who scrubbed the floors of gore, butchering the dead animals, gathering the dwarven body parts, and counting which body parts were missing. We couldn't find the second finger of Led Hillcity's right hand for weeks, not until a foul miasma alerted us to its location on top of a granite pillar, where Adil must have flung it in her rampage.

We didn't know what to do about Adil. Technically, she should have been expedition leader after Vabôk's death, having significant seniority over the rest of us, but the widows asked me to be expedition leader instead. It would have been bad precedent to let a leadership role go to the murderer of the previous holder of that office. If worries about official titles and precedents at such a time sound odd to you, understand that we were in a situation far outside of our understanding, and in such situations one reaches for the laws and regulations that hold civilization together. Adil we convinced to make caskets for the slain.

She objected to this, arguing for memorial slabs instead, and in restrospect, we should have listened more carefully to her objections. At the time, we were in no mood to listen to her on any subject. In our eyes, everything the seemingly gentle old dwarf said or did was suspect. She complied with our demands, and we thought it the best punishment available, short of hammering her to death. We did not dare raise a hand against her for fear of provoking another supernatural rampage. Besides, she was our only trained carpenter, and so she made caskets, day and night.

We were still burying bodies four weeks later when the fog rolled in from the south and the dead rose. Well, they came to life. Actual rising was beyond most of them. To this day, I'm not sure if it was for the best that Adil dismembered her victims so thoroughly. One whole zombie, with arms and legs and fingers and teeth, might have killed us all. At the same time, the same could be said of the vast horde of dismembered feet skittering on what toes Adil had left them, the upper arms scooching after us at a suprising speed with every flex of their sinister bony elbows, and the severed noses, flaring war-like at the frightened children.

Even Thob and Såkzul were terrified, desensitized though they were to horrors that would chill the bones of normal dwarves. And well they should be. I heard the screaming from Såkzul's companions too late. Before anyone had noticed its unnatural animation, the skin from the head of our loyal water buffalo -- who had come all the way to Standardash, only to be slashed to death by what we euphemistically called the Meal of Rushing -- had slithered up and suffocated Såkzul. I slashed it and stabbed it and tore it to shreds with my large copper dagger and threw the pieces into the river.

Urvad herded the remaining children quickly into the dining hall and we shut the door tight behind us. Adil and Bëmbul were not with us, but we considered the children's safety paramount. I was exhausted and bruised from battle, and Urvad was unarmed. We sat in grim silence, while horrible _things_ scuffled and slithered outside.

All at once, a growl and the sound of splintering wood came from the carpenter's workshop. Adil had changed! We listened in terror to the noises of Adil doing battle against the undead, and I honestly could not have guessed which would triumph. Three days we remained shut in that room, hoping that the werejaguar and undead creatures would finish each other off. We knew that if Adil died while the fog lay over Standardash, we were doomed.

The children took the confinement each in their own way. Etur had been bitten badly by a zombie squirrel. Aban clung close to his worried mother's side as she tended to her youngest as best she could without any medical supplies. Thob appeared largely unaffected by the gruesome demise of his last surviving family. With no zombies in sight, his terror had waned, and he had resumed his favorite pastime, the blasted Veneration of Pantomimes.

To tell the truth, it is impossible to remain utterly terrified for long stretches of time. By the second day I had grown bored of examining the wall carvings and was scrounging around for something to read. This was a dining room, not a library, but in the drawer of a desk in the back I found a tome I had never noticed before. I lay down on a bench to read.

 _These are the annals of Standardash, founded by me, Datan Crowtomb, and five others, on the 24th of Granite, 143,_ it began.

My eyes bugged out. I had discovered the lost records of the previous settlers. They were horrifying to read. Datan Crowtomb contributed the opening only. His grisly death was recorded in a different handwriting, and the death of that second bookkeeper was in turn recorded by the bookkeeper after that. Forty-two dwarves had died in this horrid swamp before we arrived. Rigòth's son and daughter-in-law and all of their children. Mafol's brother. Vabôk's wife. Two babes that had been born here in Standardash. Though the causes were not recorded, a pattern could be detected in the dates of the deaths. Most of the deaths occurred at intervals four weeks apart. The last entry in the records was signed Vabôk Gravelice.

I put down the tome to tell Urvad of my discovery, and that's when I finally realized what I was lying on. Every "bench" lining this hall was a memorial slab. I shuddered and backed away, superstition briefly overtaking me. On the third day, my curiosity overcame my discomfort, as did my desire to get Thob to stop pantomiming, for the love of Uzol! I taught Thob to read using those grave inscriptions, and we counted the dead memorialized in that room we'd been using all this time without realizing. It was more than forty-three. Much more.

On the evening of the third day, Adil called to us in a recognizably dwarven voice, announcing that the last waddling severed torso had been driven away, and that it was safe. _Safe?!_ We emerged, because what other choice did we have? By then, Etur's wound had become infected. We did our best for him, but he died two days later. I was out fetching him water when he passed away, yet I knew the exact moment he died, because Urvad let loose a wail of grief that could shake the stone itself.

We never did find Bëmbul or her body, and thank Tosid for that. Bëmbul had been out gathering persimmons when the fog came through; her fate cannot have been pretty. With her husband dead, she had no family left to mourn her, which is a mercy. The strength of Urvad's grief for her husband and son shook us all, and it occurred to me that we couldn't wait until spring or until more doomed immigrants arrived. We had to leave.

In the dark of night, while Adil was sleeping, Urvad and Aban and I crept outside and bricked up the gate to Standardash, sealing the creature that was sometimes Adil and sometimes Death itself inside. We waited in the trade depot until dawn for fear of boogeymen, and at first light the three of us set out for the Problematic Mountains, leaving Standardash behind forever.

It is possibles Adil broke down that wall. I do not know for sure what she was capable of. Perhap Adil died there, sealed in without food or water. The entire fortress can serve as her personal mausoleum for all I care. Alive or dead, I suspect she still prowls those lowland halls.

I do not recommend checking.

* * *

_In the early winter of 145, the National Mechanism of the Tool of Lucidity launched an expedition to reclaim Standardash._

**Author's Note:**

> Did Standardash Falter? was a legendary AO3-bound codex. The written portion consists of a 4390-word fic entitled Did Standardash Falter?, authored by kmfillz for Trick or Treat 2017. It concerns the settling of Zutthan Rinsedshields in Standardash in the early autumn of 144. The writing is quite self-indulgent yet it is reasonably serious. Overall, the prose is passable.
> 
> Happy Halloween!


End file.
